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Chelsea Gheesling

08/02/2013 - At a time when peer pressure can determine the actions of impressionable teenagers, Chelsea Gheesling created Good Girl Come Back (GGCB) to ignite integrity and confidence in young women.

"The more I saw the heartbreak (girls) would go through and the fleeting attention dressing immodestly will get you, the more I realized I was avoiding a lot of that drama and heartbreak," she said.

Gheesling began speaking to groups of young women about self-respect, modesty, dating, purity and friendships.

"I traveled around and a lot of organizations asked me to come to their youth groups and Girl Scout meetings to speak. After doing that for a year, I decided to build an organization around it." In 2011, Gheesling founded GGCB.

"What I was seeing was girls not knowing this way of living as an option. They aren't going to turn on the TV and figure out how to respect themselves. It's not encouraged by the mainstream media."

Gheesling holds all-day conferences at Our Lady of Refuge Catholic Church in Orchard Lake once a month and travels to high schools and middle schools throughout Michigan, sharing her message with teenage girls.

"I was lucky enough to attend a conference when I was 13 that prevented me from going down a path that a lot of kids go down."

Gheesling is honest about informing her audiences that staying on a pure path as a teenager is not the easy route, but it is a road that can lead to self-fulfillment.

"It's difficult," she said. "I'm very clear in telling them that. I tell them that they are going to be in the minority in making these good decisions."

Gheesling, a Walled Lake Central High School graduate, is a Madonna University alumnus who double majored in marketing and journalism. She worked as a marketing director, but is now able to concentrate entirely on her organization.

"The GGCB was growing quickly, so I am able to focus on it full-time now."

Gheesling also encourages young women to give back to others. She will be traveling to Haiti this month with 18 girls and their mothers whom she met through GGCB.

Additionally, Gheesling offers volunteer opportunities to girls who are unable to go to Haiti, but may be interested in helping local charities.

The West Bloomfield resident and her husband, Dan, live on Union Lake. She spends a lot of quality time with her large, tight-knit family and points to her elder female relatives for keeping her strong throughout her adolescent years.

"Every Monday I go to our family girls' night," she said. "I love it for many reasons but specifically because I get to spend time with the women I call my role models."

The popularity of GGCB is spreading quickly and Gheesling is looking forward to a busy year ahead.

"In the upcoming year, I have places being booked all over the US. It is expanding and growing and I'm so excited about that."